# 20231203 {% hint style="info" %} Context: Abe's birthday party, in London; everyone hanging out in the penthouse living area; in turn, everyone giving Abe a little affirmation/speech/thing. These are rough notes that I wrote while listening to everyone else, as I prepared to go last. I made a point not to make this a performance. I'm a skilled public speaker, and I chose not to use any of those powers here. I just gave Abe what I carried, without trying to make it a *thing*. (I didn't use all of these points when I spoke.) {% endhint %} * chair to chair -- may I appreciate you? * I am always caught off guard, and now I know I always will be * thank you for guarding me * you said: "make everything special ... because everything *is* special" * I recognize myself in that * (all I have is you in my experience, and what my experience of you points to, from every vantage point that time allows me) * time used to terrify me -- i wanted to throw a party for everything * I think I've been working to move fulltime into celebration. like, I might tear up here, but I believe that this state of apprecation is *normal*. in moments of serendipity, or a moment of beautiful support and love, I've been steering my beliefs such that I'm no longer making a big deal out of each moment. I *can* celebrate everything, but I can't have a party every time. this feels like grease on the tracks, or maybe just momentum? instead of thinking about moving the train by dragging it forward one inch at a time, brakes on the whole way, we just rolllllling now * it suits me better * and here I find you at the head of that train * I wouldn't have stood a chance meeting you any other way * I'm hearing \~12 perspectives on you, more than I can hold * any one of them would be enough for me to look closer * all of them, too much, lol * theory: gratitude requires no thought, leaves the brain unused * karen: "things Isaac said, considering things you'd never considered" * you and I fit each other now, because I'm showing you my true contours, because now I've been shown my true contours * the primary thing holding me back is that I couldn't stand the idea of hurting someone else * learning I had autism, turns out I'm even *worse* than everyone else at making assessments like that * so, I'm free * shelby was talking about your belief in the good that's coming, liz talked about you dreaming bigger for her than she could * maybe we dream for each other * maybe we help each other with the things we can't believe * kinda works with the electric monk idea * I can't tell if you led me here, but I am here with you, and our relationship is as current as it was on day one * more than dewdrops, standing in the rain. I think about water metaphors too * throughput * I think a lot about what it means to be a steward of so much flow * or to flip from water to trees, what it means to be a trunk, and to hold up branches without holding it over them * you've demonstrated that to me this year * I don't care, go on and tear me apart -coldplay * been feeling like this lately * self vs other right? just gonna go with what's true and let go completely of my self-concept and other-concept and see how they shift, when the only thing I hold onto is this nexus of truth at the center * if we look backwards using memory, we see what happened. if we look forwards using memory, we see a continuation of the same. changing the energy of the moment, we see a different future, and I think that comes with a kind of changing the past. maybe/probably not literally, but, why do I have to live in such a way that my past makes sense? I don't have to make sense of that. and so it's a sort of timeline-travel -- not time-travel, but timeline-travel --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://www.isaacbowen.com/2023/12/03.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.